


questions 67 & 68

by oryx



Category: The Conjuring (2013)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-25
Updated: 2013-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-06 02:34:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1101354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oryx/pseuds/oryx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Another day, another ghost hunt. (This one far less stressful.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	questions 67 & 68

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cherryvanilla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherryvanilla/gifts).



> this was meant to be in the regular collection but i was too slow, oop ( ´Д｀)  
> i was so happy to see that someone else shipped them! so of course i had to write something, but this was written in like a day so i apologize for any errors or lack of quality... anyway, i hope you have a lovely yuletide!

He gives it two weeks before making the call. It’s seven p.m. and it’s quiet at the station, like it always is and how it always should be, because this is Burrillville and he almost ticketed someone for jaywalking the other day just for something to do. He’s flipping through some old paperwork, reading without really absorbing, when there’s a sudden, muffled _thump_ from somewhere behind him. He nearly jumps out of his damn skin, heart jackhammering away in his chest, and spins around to see –

 

To see Robertson looking at him strangely from across the room. “Sorry, man,” he says, a question in his voice, and holds up the book he just dropped. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

 

And that, he thinks, is the final fucking straw.

 

He punches in the number and leans back in his chair, fingers drumming on the armrest, an inexplicable nervousness prickling at his skin. It rings once, twice… By the time it reaches six rings he’s about to hang up, but at the very last moment a familiar voice crackles to life over the line.

 

“Yello?”

 

“Ah… hey,” he says. “It’s me.”

 

He groans inwardly as soon as the words leave his mouth. What the hell is he thinking? Who says ‘it’s me’ to someone they barely know?

 

Thankfully, Drew seems unfazed by this startling display of awkwardness.

 

“Brad, my man,” he laughs. “How goes it over in Ghost Country, USA? No more spooky shit to report, I hope?”

 

“Nah, nothing like that,” he says. “I just… I don’t know. Things’ve been kind of…” He trails off, taking a shaky breath. “You, uh… You think we could talk sometime? Maybe go out for a beer or something, my treat? Whenever you’re not busy, I mean.”

 

Drew is silent for a moment.

 

“Yeah,” he says finally, and the easygoing lilt to his voice has faded a bit. “Yeah, absolutely. This Friday, maybe? That good for you? I’ve actually been meaning to drop by and take some more pictures, so it’s not, like… out of my way or anything. Though I’m guessing the bar scene in Burrillville isn’t exactly hopping.”

 

Brad laughs and feels himself unwind a little, the tension in his shoulders relaxing. “You would be correct in that assumption. Sorry in advance. There’s probably a dozen places you’d rather be than Burrillville on a Friday night.”

 

“Nah,” Drew says. “‘S all good. If there’s free drinks and good company I can’t really refuse, right?”

 

For some reason, the words “good company” echo in Brad’s mind long after he gets off the phone.

 

.

 

.

 

Monroe’s is far too clean to truly count as a dive bar – newly-upholstered stools, an actually-operational television, and only a faint, stale smell of cigarettes about the place – but he’s fairly sure it’s still the grungiest establishment in the greater Rhode Island area. Drew seems to consider the place when he walks in, taking it in in all its gloomy glory. He lifts a hand when he spots Brad; walks over and slides on to the stool next to him.

 

“Hey man, how’s it going? Hope you weren’t waiting too long.” He turns to Mike the Bartender (whose last name is highly unpronounceable and not, in fact, Monroe) and says he’ll have whatever Brad’s having. Mike looks like he’s about to card him until Brad shakes his head subtly.

 

“No,” Brad lies. He’s been sitting here for about a half an hour, honestly, but that’s between him and Mike. “Just a few minutes.”

 

The Stones are on Late Night and soon enough they’re on the topic of music. They make inane small talk for a while (Brad’s a straightforward rock’n’roll guy, Drew’s into the more… ‘out there’ stuff, but they both hate Chicago, so that’s something) until finally Brad can’t take it any longer.

 

“How do you do it?” he asks softly.

 

Drew pauses, beer halfway to his lips, and blinks at him. “Do what?”

 

“I mean, how do you go back to your normal life after… after _that_?” He swallows hard, fingers curled tight against his thigh, nails digging in sharp. “God, I just keep _thinking_ about it. I can’t stop. Every time I see something move out of the corner of my eye my pulse starts pounding. People come up behind me and tap me on the shoulder and I flip a shit. Christ, I haven’t slept more than four hours a night since. You would not believe how fucking tired I am right now. I am _this_ close to putting my head down and passing out on this weirdly sticky bar.”

 

“Fuck, dude,” Drew mutters. He reaches over and claps him on the shoulder awkwardly. “You need to relax. Just take a deep breath, alright? I’d, uh… I’d offer you some weed, but I have a dumbass cousin who once passed a bong to a cop, so… Let’s just say I learned through example on that one.”

 

Brad huffs out a laugh that sounds more a choked sob.

 

“Listen,” Drew continues. He lowers his voice to an intent whisper. “The things we saw in that house? That was some fucked up shit. I’ve never seen anything like that in my life, and I’m pretty sure I’ll never see anything like it again. That was a _demon_ , man. Those are pretty damn rare. Most supernatural stuff is just ghosts, and most ghosts are super harmless.”

 

“Harmless,” Brad echoes. “Right. Yeah.”

 

“I’m serious! Here, let me tell you a story, okay? This was back when I first hooked up with Ed and Lorraine, one of my very first jobs with them. This guy – Joe – his dad had just had a heart attack and kicked it, and left him his house in his will, right? This was the house where Joe had grown up as a kid, up until his mom died in a car crash and his dad went all… depression-y, y’know? He hadn’t been able to take care of Joe, so the kid got shipped off to live with his aunt and uncle and from then on he only saw his dad in special ‘supervised’ circumstances. So fast forward to two decades later: Dad buys the farm, Joe gets the house, and he’s been looking for a new place anyway so he decides ‘hey, might as well move back in.’

 

“Now pretty much as soon as he sets foot in this place, shit starts going off the rails. Doors banging, lights flickering, appliances turning on by themselves, all the cliché haunting stuff. He even came home one night to find _every single_ piece of furniture rearranged. So obviously he’s freaking out, right? He calls in the Ghost Squad,” and here Drew grins in a self-satisfied manner, “to check the place out. Turns out the ghost he was so afraid of was his own mom. She’d been hanging around the house for years and years, waiting for Joe to come back, all because she had something _crazy_ important to tell him. And you know what it was? She wanted to say she was sorry for missing his fifth grade piano recital.

 

“See, the day she died she’d had to work some unexpected overtime. She’d promised Joe that she would make it to his recital, so when she finally left work she was rushing, trying to get there in time to catch the last few minutes of his performance. She was so preoccupied that she went straight through a red light, and… yeah. You see where I’m going with this. So she proceeded to hang around her old house in ghost form for more than twenty fucking years simply to tell her son how sorry she was for missing his dumbass recital. As if he gave a shit about that, right? I even asked him about it. He said he barely remembered the damn thing, except that he’d been glad his mom wasn’t there because his playing had been so awful.”

 

Despite everything, Brad can feel an amused smile tug at his lips. “Damn. That’s irony at its finest.”

 

“Right? Basically what I’m trying to say is that ghosts aren’t some ‘incomprehensible force of the unknown’ or whatever. They’re just… dead people. They’re just as focused on meaningless, inconsequential crap as living people, y’know? Some of them do stick around ‘cause they’ve got ‘important unfinished business,’ but honestly? Most of them are just worried they left the oven on or they forgot to pay the phone bill or some shit. So when you do come across another ghost – ”

 

“Wait, ‘when’?” Brad says, interrupting him. “You saying it’s a guaranteed thing?”

 

“Living _here_? In the middle of all these ‘historical landmarks’? Hell yeah it’s guaranteed.” Drew pauses, then, staring out the window thoughtfully. A moment later and there is a wicked glint forming in his eye. “Actually… That could be an interesting experiment. ‘Exactly how easy is it to find ghosts in old, abandoned Rhode Island buildings?’ You down to find out?”

 

Brad raises an eyebrow. “I hope you’re not suggesting breaking and entering.”

 

“Whaaat? No way, man,” Drew says, with a dismissive wave of his hand. “It’s not breaking and entering if you’ve got a cop with you.”

 

.

 

.

 

“We really shouldn’t be here,” he mutters. “This place hasn’t been condemned for fifteen goddamn years for no reason, you know. The floor looks like it’s about to collapse any minute – ”

 

There is a faint sound from his left and he spins on his heel, heart in his throat, shining the flashlight to reveal… water dripping from a hole in the ceiling. He sighs and turns back, trying to ignore the amused look Drew is giving him.

 

“Right,” he drawls. “The _floor_ is what’s making you jumpy. Gotcha. You wanna hold hands or something, bro? That might make you feel better.”

 

“Shut up,” Brad mutters, and soldiers on ahead through the darkened hallway. He peers around a corner and tries not to shudder at the abandoned wheelchair lying in the middle of the hall.

 

“So how’d you get into all this stuff anyway?” he asks, because fuck, it’s way too quiet in this place. “Just woke up one day and said ‘I think I’ll go hunt ghosts’…?”

 

Drew laughs. “Well… kinda? My senior year of college I still had no fuckin’ clue what I wanted to do with my life. I was one of those kids who partied more than I studied, y’know? I ended up majoring in ‘social sciences’ and to this day I don’t really know what that shit means. But… this one weekend Ed and Lorraine came by to give a lecture, right? My friends dragged me along ‘cause they wanted to laugh at the ‘crazies.’ And I just sat there listening to their stories and I thought… Yeah. Yeah, that’s what I want to be doing.”

 

“So you weren’t… skeptical at all?”

 

“About ghosts? Nah, man. I’ve always pretty much believed in them. Saw my grandma’s ghost when I was nine or so, and ever since I’ve been way into paranormal stuff.” The strange device in his hand begins to beep quietly, then, and he comes to a halt, lifting his own flashlight to examine the readings. “Aw yeah, this is looking promising. Hold this stuff for a sec, will you?”

 

He foists everything he’s carrying on to Brad, opening up his bag to pull out a camera.

 

Brad eyes him warily as he fiddles with the lens. “‘Promising’ as in… there’s most likely a ghost standing a few feet away?”

 

“We can only hope,” Drew says with a grin, and the resulting flash from the camera is almost blinding. After a couple more shots he turns to Brad and tells him to get in the picture.

 

“Once you start feeling really cold, that’s when you’ll know you’re right next to it,” he says, an alarming kind of cheeriness to his voice.

 

“Are you shitting me?” Brad hisses.

 

“C’mon, dude, I promise this’ll be good for you. You and the ghost will have a little bonding moment and suddenly all your worries will melt away. Or something like that.”

 

Brad stares at him for a long moment, disbelieving, then grits out a sigh and takes a few cautious steps forward. God, what the hell is he doing? This is exactly the kind of stupid shit that got a chunk taken out of his face not even a month ago. He can’t see anything but he can certainly _feel_ something, a presence off to his side, and he moves closer to it warily.

 

“Maybe one more step,” Drew says, and when he does he _knows_ that it’s there. The cold that washes over him is unlike any natural chill, sliding heavy across his skin and raising the hairs on the back of his neck. It’s hard to breathe. The air seems thick, pressing in around him and tugging at his ankles.

 

“Geezus, Drew, take the damn picture,” he growls, and is fairly sure he blinks when the flash goes off.

 

.

 

.

 

They sit in his car to look through the Polaroids. The first one doesn’t reveal much – just an empty hallway with a faint disturbance in the corner that could easily be an error in the film. But by the third photo it’s obvious that the ‘disturbance’ – small, shadowy, and vaguely human-shaped – is moving toward the camera of its own volition.

 

“Look at this,” Drew says, leaning over with the last Polaroid in his hand. Brad leans in as well. It’s the photo with him in it, and the expression on his face is rather comical – a combination of pale, drawn, and intensely disgruntled. The shadowy form from the previous photos is standing directly next to him. Its head (or what he can make of it) comes up to his waist, and it almost seems to be staring up at him. If he looks close enough he can see something that resembles a tiny hand, reaching out to touch him…

 

“Why did this hospital shut down?” Drew asks.

 

“Oh, uh… There was a fire. I heard it started in the pediatric ward and then it spread – ” He breaks off, realization dawning. There’s a tight feeling in his chest. He looks down at the photograph once more and whispers, “Oh.”

 

“Yeah,” Drew sighs. “Thought it must be something like that. I love this job, but it’s like… ten percent freaky, thirty percent badass, and sixty percent depressing as hell. A lot of kids end up as ghosts. They just don’t really get it, y’know? That they’re dead.”

 

“Yeah,” Brad murmurs. He continues staring at the photo until he realizes how he and Drew are leaning into each other, faces close and shoulders brushing. His skin is warm where their arms are pressed up against one another. He finds himself thinking that Drew’s hair smells good (once he ignores the faint, musty scent of dust from the hospital). Brad clears his throat and pulls away, fumbling around for the keys.

 

“You, uh… you want me to drop you off back at the bar?”

 

“Yeah, sure,” Drew says, still engrossed in the photos. As they pull out of the derelict parking lot he mutters: “Damn, it’s so weird to be riding in the passenger seat of a police car.”

 

“What? Don’t tell me you’ve got a checkered past,” Brad laughs.

 

“I wouldn’t call it _checkered_ , but… Let’s just say I went through a rebellious teenage phase. And that I was not a particularly skilled shoplifter.” He grins. “What about you? I don’t think I’ve ever met a cop without at least one arrest on his personal record.”

 

“Oh hell no, I am not talking about that. I…” He trails off and sighs, already feeling that flush of embarrassment creeping up the back of his neck. “Yeah, alright, I’ve got one. Drunk and disorderly.”

 

“Seriously?? God, that sounds priceless.”

 

“Yeah, I’m just… not very good with hard liquor,” he mutters. “Most people know not to give it to me, unless they want me passed out on the floor two hours into the party. Or worse.”

 

“That,” Drew says, “I will have to remember for future reference.”

 

Brad turns his head to check for oncoming traffic and shares a small, private smile with himself. For some reason those two words – “future reference” – are strangely pleasing, settling warm in his chest.

 

Ten minutes later they pull up once more to the bar. He cuts the ignition and they sit there in silence for a time.

 

“Thanks,” he says finally.

 

“No prob,” Drew says. “Helping people conquer their fear of the unknown – all in a day’s work for the Ghost Squad.” He looks over at Brad contemplatively. “And if you’re ever feeling traumatized over… all of _that_ again, try looking on bright side of things: at least you’ve got that badass scar now. Most people wouldn’t believe you got it from a demon, of course, but you could make up some other story. Mountain lion attack, maybe?”

 

Brad laughs, but feels a jolt course through him when Drew’s hand comes to rest on the back of his neck, pulling him in.

 

“Lean a little closer, will you? Jesus, I can almost see the teeth marks… Does that shit still hurt?”

 

“Uh… yeah, kinda,” he says gruffly. Drew’s palm is hot against his neck, a firm, anchoring kind of weight, and Brad’s hands grip the steering wheel tight enough to turn his knuckles white. He turns and Drew is alarmingly close to him again, looking up at him curiously from beneath that mop of dark hair. His lips are parted slightly and something in Brad's mind just shortcircuits. When he ducks his head to kiss him he can hear a faint voice of reason screaming ‘no, you fucking idiot' in the back of his mind. The kiss is quick and laughably chaste. He pulls away just as fast to find Drew looking more startled than anything, which is probably the best he can hope for at this point.

 

“I’m not like that,” he blurts out, and Drew blinks at him for a moment before snickering.

 

“Dude, you’re the one who just kissed me,” he says. “You don’t get to say that.”

 

“I'm… I'm not…” He’s not sure what he’s trying to say. He flounders around helplessly for the right words before giving up.

 

“On second thought, I really hate driving in the middle of the night,” Drew says, seemingly out of the blue, leveling Brad with a thoughtful look. “You mind if I crash at your place?”

 

The steering wheel feels like as if it might break in two if he grips it any tighter.

 

“Nah, I don’t mind,” he says, and good God, his voice is embarrassingly hoarse.

 

(Nothing happens, in the end. He invites Drew in and lowers himself down on to the couch and promptly passes out from sheer tiredness, waking ten hours later to find Drew still there somehow, watching a godawful Elvis movie and eating all his Corn Flakes.

 

“Morning,” Drew says casually, passing him a glass of water. Their hands brush and even through his grogginess Brad’s pulse jumps. Christ, he thinks. What is he, some kind of blushing schoolgirl?

 

“Morning,” he says in return. He takes a sip of the water and realizes with a start that he can remember all of his dreams in vivid detail. They had certainly been strange, but not a single one of them had featured a spectre, demon, or otherworldly being of any kind.

 

Brad smiles faintly, the last of his tension unwinding, and settles in to watch Elvis make a damn fool of himself.)


End file.
